


Orientation

by ariadnerue



Category: Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. (TV)
Genre: F/M, Originally Posted on FanFiction.Net
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-11-25
Updated: 2014-11-25
Packaged: 2018-02-26 23:04:31
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,985
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2669708
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ariadnerue/pseuds/ariadnerue
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Trauma. What an elegant word. It didn't at all suit the complete emotional shambles she now found herself in.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Orientation

**Author's Note:**

> Originally posted on ff.net between seasons 1 and 2. Takes place then too.

"Agent Simmons? Agent Simmons, did you hear me?"

Simmons blinked and looked up. Agent Koenig- Agent Billy Koenig- was staring at her impatiently over the monitor bank. The setup of the lie detector here at the Playground was virtually identical to the one at Providence, which was off-putting enough without the presiding officer who was virtually identical to a man Simmons had found dead in a storage room not so long ago.

But that wasn't why Simmons was having trouble focusing on her "orientation." Not by a longshot.

"Sorry, could you repeat the question?" she asked quietly, trying desperately to reign in her attention. It wasn't usually this difficult for her to narrow her thoughts. Koenig just gave her a sad sort of smile.

"Agent Simmons, I understand that you've been through some… trauma, recently," he began delicately. Simmons wrinkled her nose in distaste. Trauma. What an elegant word. It didn't at all suit the complete emotional shambles she now found herself in. "But please, I ask that you try to focus on the test, and we'll get it done quickly."

"Right, of course," Simmons replied even as her thoughts drifted back to Fitz.

Fitz. Fitz who sat in that pod at the bottom of the ocean knowing there was no way out but still didn't wake her. Fitz who loved her. Fitz who toiled away at an escape route knowing there was only enough escape for her but still didn't tell her until the very end. Fitz who loved her. Fitz who was lying in a coma in the medical bay exactly one hundred and eight steps from this room (she had counted in her head on the way here). Fitz who loved her.

"What is your full name?" Koenig asked, eyes on the screens in front of him.

"Jemma Elizabeth Simmons," Simmons answered automatically.

"Eye color?" Koenig glanced up at her.

"Brown," Simmons muttered, her gaze drifting to the door. She could see Skye out in the hall, leaning against the opposite wall and yawning. She was the only one left to be tested after Simmons.

"Have you ever been married?"

"No," Simmons sighed. She'd never been the type to think about marriage. Even as a little girl, when the other girls her age were fantasizing about their dream weddings, she was trying to invent a type of self-repairing plastic. It had never even crossed her mind that she might not be spending the rest of her life with Fitz. How could she have been so blind?

"Try to concentrate, Agent Simmons," Koenig said, and his voice sounded far away. Simmons snapped her eyes back to him, nodding briskly. "List your immediate family."

"Just my mum and my dad," she managed to smile just a bit at their mention. They loved Fitz from the moment they met him. They always teased her about him, asking if they had a date set yet or what their kids' names would be. She had always just gotten embarrassed and changed the subject.

"What's the difference between an egg and a rock?"

Simmons let out a long sigh, barely resisting the urge to roll her eyes. "The differences are far too many to list. I'm a scientist. It's an absurd question," she said with all the snark she could muster. It wasn't much. Still, Koenig chuckled a bit and nodded before he continued.

"Have you ever heard of Project Insight?"

"No." Same as last time. The only times she'd heard of it were these fun little lie detector tests.

"Have you ever had any contact with Alexander Pierce?"

"No, though Fitz and I did see him at the Triskelion once," she said without thinking. Her heart thudded painfully when she said his name. "Well… we saw him walk across the lobby, anyway."

Koenig stared at his screens a moment longer than usual before he continued. "You wash up on a deserted island alone. Sitting on the sand is a box. What is in that box?"

Simmons paused. She had said the TARDIS last time. It seemed a silly answer now. She swallowed hard.

"Fitz," she said quietly. A lump formed in her throat and she could feel the stinging at the back of her eyes. Damn. She was going to cry again. She was getting really tired of crying.

"Last question," Koenig said quickly. She could hear the urgency in his voice, and it occurred to her that he could tell she was about to cry and he had no idea how to handle it. It would almost be funny if she didn't feel like only half of her heart was beating. "SHIELD no longer exists. The agency has been labelled a terrorist organization. So, why are you here?"

Jemma closed her eyes, hot tears rolling down her cheeks as she let out a humorless laugh. "Fitz," she repeated.

Koenig stared hard at the screens in front of him. He looked uncomfortable. "Alright, um… look, your crying appears to be skewing the test results," he said awkwardly. "So is there any way you could um… stop crying? Please?"

Simmons stared at him. Fitz would find this hilarious.

And just like that, she started sobbing. She broke down completely, hunching over in the test chair and bawling into her hands despite the wires attached to her fingers.

"Oh no, please don't," Koenig blurted, quailing behind the monitor bank. "I'm terrible with crying people. Um… it's um… it's going to be okay?"

The door slammed open and Koenig and Simmons both jumped. Skye was standing in the doorway, and she looked mad as hell.

"Why is Simmons crying?" she demanded immediately, and Koenig threw up his hands as if in surrender. "What the hell did you do to her, Koenig?"

"I didn't… it wasn't… I mean I just…" he stammered, gesturing helplessly between Simmons and the monitors.

"It's not his fault, Skye," Simmons said quickly, concerned that Skye would injure the poor man. "I'm just coming completely unhinged, that's all."

A fresh wave of sobs overtook her and she buried her face in her hands. How was she supposed to do this without him? How was she supposed to do anything without him?

The next thing she knew, Koenig was handing her a lanyard as Skye shepherded her out of the room, shooting scathing looks at Koenig all the while.

"Uh okay then, you take your time," Koenig called after them down the hall. "But you do have to come back and do the test at some point, Agent Skye. …Agent Skye?"

Skye ignored him, completely absorbed in trying to comfort the bawling mess that had once been Jemma Simmons.

She didn't know how much time passed while she cried, but when she finally calmed down enough to take in her surroundings, she was sitting in a small seating area straight across the hall from the medical bay with a mug of tea in her hands and Skye at her side. She sniffled, staring through the large window into the medical bay.

There he was, same as she left him, looking for all the world like he was just sleeping on that hospital bed. Except he never slept on his back and he tended to make faces in his sleep, which she had always found funny but never told him about. Now he lay perfectly still, his arm in a cast and his cuts and bruises healing, connected to a dozen or more machines telling her what she already knew.

His vitals were steady, his brain was functioning, but he still wasn't awake.

"Hey."

Simmons jumped, startled, and she would have dropped her tea if another pair of hands hadn't shot out and caught it.

"Sorry," Skye said quietly as she placed the mug on the table in front of them. "You've just… been crying a long time."

Simmons nodded vacantly, wiping the remaining tears from her face. She sniffled again. "I've never cried so much in my entire life," she admitted. "I just… I just don't know what to do without him."

Skye stared at her for a long time, and Simmons could see her eyes getting glassy with tears of her own.

"Honestly, I've never been close to someone the way you are with Fitz," she began slowly. "So I can't even begin to imagine what you're going through right now. But… I'm here, okay?"

At that, Simmons actually managed a smile. "Okay," she replied, and Skye smiled back. "Thank you." She turned her gaze back to Fitz. "Would you mind if I just… vent, for a bit?"

"Please, vent away," Skye laughed lightly.

"This is the longest I've gone without hearing his voice since we met," Simmons blurted immediately. "And we met on our first day at SHIELD Academy, during orientation." She paused, letting out another sardonic laugh. "Orientation. Funny. That's what the Koenigs call the lie detector test. And it's an appropriate term for me right now because without Fitz it's like I can't… I just…" She trailed off helplessly. "I can't get myself oriented, I guess. Like I can't figure out which way is up. Does that make any sense?"

Skye just nodded, and Simmons couldn't tell if she wasn't speaking because she wanted her to keep going or if she was going to cry. So she continued anyway.

"And now that I have all this time with my own thoughts, I realize that I've become completely codependent. I couldn't even tell you when it happened. It's like I can barely remember what it was like before I had him," Simmons rambled. She knew she was talking too fast and she could only hope Skye could keep up. The only one who usually could keep up was in a coma on the other side of the glass. "And that scares me, but at the same time I feel like it's the best thing that ever happened to me. And when Koenig asked what would be in the box on the deserted island, I said Fitz. If I could have anything in the entire world with me, it would be him. He is everything to me. And I think I'm in love with him."

A ringing silence followed that final sentence. Skye's eyes had gone wide and her mouth was hanging open a bit, and Simmons could only assume she was making the same face. She hadn't meant to say that. She hadn't even realized she was thinking that. But now that she'd said it… it felt right.

"Oh gosh," she whispered, reaching up and running a hand distractedly through her hair. "I'm in love with him."

Skye said something, but Simmons didn't hear her. Her entire world was tilting sideways. It was practically all she'd thought about since she woke up on Fury's jet, but she'd never actually said it out loud. She'd never actually admitted it to herself. Of course she loved him. All she had ever done was love him.

She didn't remember getting to her feet and walking into the medical bay, but the next thing she knew she was standing at Fitz's bedside with one of his hands squeezed tight in both of hers. Skye was still out in the hall and Simmons briefly felt guilty for just abruptly leaving her out there, but then she looked at Fitz and nothing else mattered in the entire world.

"I love you, Fitz," she whispered. She felt her eyes stinging again, but she had no tears left. She sighed. "I love you so much."

She sat down in the chair beside his bed without letting go of his hand. The world felt a little less sideways now, she supposed, but she knew nothing would be right again until he woke up. Until she heard his voice, she just couldn't get properly oriented.

So she would just have to wait here, by his side, until he could tell her which way was up.


End file.
